The Thing With Feathers

I guess the nicest part of yesterday was sitting on the steps of my back porch. I had a large bottle of Belgian ale by my side, and I was just quietly sitting there as the chicken cooked on the grill. This is the most delicious beer I've ever tasted, and it's pleasant to think about how maybe you don't have the best of everything but you can have the best of something, at least. It was quiet, just the 19th-century houses and the trees among them. At one point a young woman ordered a young man out of her car about 11 times, loudly cursing him for some misbehavior, but other than that, as I say, it was quiet. I watched the chimney swifts flying back and forth, giving out their chipping call, and noted how high they sometimes fly. Way up there, some of them were. So fragile, but such altitude they reach—like hopes, I thought. And grinned with rueful amusement. And took another sip of ale.